Indian TV Network Sues Nielsen Over Ratings Data

By VIKAS BAJAJ

Published: August 1, 2012

MUMBAI, India -- A leading Indian television network has sued the Nielsen Company, accusing its Indian joint venture of providing ''false, fabricated and manipulated data'' on TV ratings for almost a decade.

The Indian network, New Delhi Television, or NDTV, says the manipulated data cost it nearly a billion dollars in advertising revenue, and the suit is seeking several billion dollars in damages.

The company filed the suit late last week in New York State Supreme Court against Nielsen; its Indian joint venture, TAM Media Research; and Kantar Media Research, which owns a 50 percent stake in the Indian business.

NDTV, which is best known for broadcasting a 24-hour English-language news station, accuses employees of TAM of manipulating ratings in exchange for kickbacks from other TV networks. It further says that Nielsen, TAM and Kantar executives did not move to address the problems when NDTV presented ''evidence of corruption and manipulation'' to them earlier this year in several meetings, some of which were attended by senior Nielsen and Kantar executives.

TAM declined to comment on the case. A spokeswoman for NDTV, Renee Chandola, also declined to comment.

India's TV business has boomed in the 20 years since the government allowed private companies into broadcasting, with dozens of channels offering news, entertainment and sports programming. But many Indian TV networks, some of which are owned by politicians and corporate tycoons, earn little or no profit, analysts say, because of fierce competition among them.

NDTV, which competes with more than a dozen big news channels, lost 260 million rupees ($4.7 million) in the three months that ended June 30, more than the 179 million rupees it lost in the same period a year earlier. The company's stock closed at 53.20 rupees (about 96 cents) on Tuesday, down from a record high of 499 rupees in early 2008.

TAM, which was created from the 1998 merger of two competing ratings firms owned by Nielsen and Kantar, has been accused of providing incorrect ratings data in the past by an Indian newsmagazine, Outlook, and one of the country's biggest TV networks, Zee. Still, it remains the definitive source of ratings in the country and its data is used by Indian advertisers and networks to price airtime.

In its suit, NDTV accuses the defendants of fraud, negligence, misrepresentation, conspiracy and other offenses. The company argues that TAM ratings were easily manipulated because the company collected data only on the TV watching habits of 8,150 homes equipped with electronic monitoring devices. By comparison, NDTV argues the sample size for TV ratings in China, a country of comparable size to India, is 55,000 homes. NDTV said it asked TAM to collect data from at least 30,000 homes, but was rebuffed because the ratings firm said that would be too expensive.

NDTV said two field employees of TAM met its executives at a Mumbai Ramada hotel in April and offered to help the channel lift its ratings if it agreed to pay them $250 to $500 for each home that they got to watch NDTV's channels. NDTV said it had a security firm photograph that meeting. It recorded another ''sting operation'' on video, which it later showed to a Nielsen security executive visiting from the United States, Robert Messemer. It also introduced Nielsen executives to a consultant who said he was a go-between for TV channels in their dealings with TAM employees.

The Hollywood Reporter reported on the NDTV lawsuit on Monday.

PHOTO: NDTV, best known for its 24-hour news station, accused Nielsen's Indian unit of taking kickbacks from other networks.